Its taken me over a week to decide how to convey mine and my families Latitude Festival experience this year. Part of me wanted to sugar coat it and say everything was brilliant but a blogger should really be honest, so its fair to say Latitude this year was a bit of a mixed bag. For the most part it was a great experience but there were moments of what I like to call festival entitlement from other people in attendance, once instance in particular, that left a sour taste in my throat at times.

I noticed the sense of entitlement from the off. We arrived around 3pm on the Thursday and had to queue to get into the family camping, the first time in our three visits we’d had to do this. It took us about 30 minutes to get in and while my two kiddies were perfectly behaved I wish I could say the same for all the adults in the queue. Some quite blatantly cut down the side of the long queue with their trolleys to get near the front, queuing apparently beneath them. Then the guy in front of us complained about the queues and even before he’d stepped foot into the festival declared to his wife that “this is ridiculous, this is the last year we come here”, I was gobsmacked ! In light of recent events I expected a bit of queuing, all major events going forward will be tightening up on security till it just ends up being the norm. To complain to the extent that this gentleman did shows either a complete lack of understanding of recent events or just a sense of entitlement that is slowly creeping into large social events. This sense of entitlement reared its ugly head at the wristband exchange as well as due to the fact I had a large trolley a full family decided to push right past me even though a steward was instructing people where to go when the wristband volunteers were free, the steward did however apologise for the behaviour of said family.

Once we got in we set up our tent with military speed and precision with a bit of help from one of the charity concierge volunteers, did our second run to the car and before we knew it everything was set up inside the tent and we were on our way to explore. Ellie wanted a braid putting into her hair so we found a tent which provided the service in the village and they did an amazing job. The kids over the course of the weekend threw themselves into the festival spirit like never before, they have always enjoyed our adventures to Latitude but this year in particular they have really blossomed and seemed unbelievably comfortable within the festival environment, almost like its becoming a home away from home. Whether it be in the clothing they are now picking to wear, becoming glitter kids on the Friday, or actually wanting to see more music now and seeing in as a highlight and not something they have to do with Mummy and Daddy, they have really matured in the past 12 months.

 

 

A personal highlight for myself and Niki was seeing the kids, especially Jacob, throw themselves into the numerous amazing activities or workshops the festival offers in both the Enchanted Garden and the Kids Area. Friday saw hulla hooping, face painting, yarn spinning and dream catcher making, Saturday there was t-shirt screen printing, headband making, pom pom making, felt making, clay face sculpturing, spoon painting and rope tree climbing,  while Sunday was filled with tree netting, musical instrument and science workshops, it was jam packed !

Leading up to the festival I felt the line up was a little bit light of the wow factor it has had in previous years and on reflection after the fact I stand by that statement. While we all enjoyed The 1975 and Mumford and Sons there was a lot of the time that if we wanted to seek out some music to watch the line up was a bit light of star names, yes, a lot of the names were recognisable to a more mature generation like myself, but if you want to market yourself as a family festival like latitude does more effort needs to be made to have acts that will interest the younger crowd as well as the older clientele. The festival increased its capacity this year and if it looking to grow and expand then the quality of the line up needs to grow with it. I’m a firm believer that if a festival wants to be considered a major event in the summer festival calendar then the top 3 or 4 acts on the main stage each day should have the wow factor and Latitude didn’t achieve that this year. The Sunday especially this year was a weak day, after Mavis Staples, we were pretty much filling time with bumbling about the site until JackDaws Danger Show was the finale of our weekend in the kids area.

There were some amazing highlights musically but they were a bit few and far between this year. The 1975 were excellent and will move onto bigger slots at larger festivals once album No. 3 is out. Persuading the kids to leave The 1975 to go see the end of Placebos set was an amazing moment, for months we’ve tried to get the kids into Placebo with no luck but seeing a band live can be a very different experience and something seemed to click with the kids as they loved watching Placebo in the hot, sweaty 6 Music tent.  The Saturday we went to see a young up and coming female singer called Liv Dawson on the Lake Stage. She didn’t pull a massive crowd so the kids watched from the front of the barrier and were very interested in seeing Liv and her band perform in such close proximity. Having already worked with the likes of Disclosure I see big things for in the near future. The end of Mumford’s set was also a highlight as it was spent just with Jacob, as Niki and Ellie had gone off to get the eldest something to eat, he sat on my shoulders at the back of the field bellowing out hits like “Roll Away Your Stone” surrounded by other attending families, it was really special. I just wish the rest of the set could have been as special, but more on that later.

The musical highlight for me over the weekend was seeing Mavis Staples on the Sunday. Sometimes you know your in the presence of greatness and she was everything I hoped for and more, from the moment she walked on the stage she had the crowd in the palm of her hand and you just felt like you were watching a living, breathing piece of history singing right in front of you. Mavis had swagger like no one else on that main stage all weekend, she’s been there, seen it and done it and has been performing for 67 year ! Her voice was absolutely mind blowing live as was her stage presence, it was an absolute privilege to say I’ve seen her perform live.

staples

The Saturday saw Mumford’s bring their “Gentlemen of the Road” Takeover to Latitude and while a lot was promised in advance online, with such boasts of a day full of surprises and that it’d be a day at Latitude like no other on the whole I was really disappointed with it. There were no big surprises throughout the day and apart from changing the look of the main stage area the rest of the festival felt just like Latitude. The fact that Mumford and Sons had instructed the festival that no one else should be playing on the other stages while they were on was a very short sighted decision by both band and festival, the main stage arena was just too full while they were on and festival entitlement reared its ugly head once again. My daughter needed the toilet half way through Mumford’s set and feeling increasingly confident with going through crowds had got herself in front of myself and Niki, everyone she politely asked to excuse and move by dually obliged, as you should at a festival if there’s a route out, no ones space is precious ! A couple with some chairs behind them,  space and a route out at one side then took great delight in stepping in my 10 year old daughters path and rudely telling her to find another way out, I couldn’t believe it, I was furious but didn’t want to kick off in front of my wife and kids. We found another way out but Ellie was absolutely gutted, she just couldn’t understand how those people could be so mean. Luckily there was a group of guys following our route out who were also confronted by said couple and they set them straight using a few choice words, one of them even walked over one of the couples chairs, karmas a bitch !

All in all Latitude this year still had moments of magic but the Latitude of 2017 is very different to the Latitude of two years ago, as the festival is trying to grow there’s more of a commercial edge to it than previous years that brings in a different type of clientele. Latitude 2015 really did feel like a family friendly boutique festival, that boutique element felt on the fringes of the festival this year as more corporate sponsorship was in place this year around the main stages. This weekend saw the last ever Secret Garden Party so I just hope boutique style festivals don’t die a death or, like Latitude seems to be, increase capacity and revenue streams but in turn chip away at what made it so special.  If they do continue to try to grow or hope that the quality of the line up improves with it, as smaller festivals like Kendal Calling have shown that you can organically grow a festival but offer stellar line ups year in year out. Its funny I mentioned Kendal as an example, as much as we’ve loved our 3 years at Latitude next year we’ve already booked for Kendal Calling 2018, we cant wait !